A jazz pianist and film composer, Krzysztof Komeda wrote his own chapter in the history of soundtracks with compositions like the lullaby for Rosemary’s Baby from Roman Polanski. “Komeda was the soundtrack-composer par excellence”, says Roman Polanski, “Without his music my films would be worthless.” It is actually due to Polanski himself that Komeda turns towards film and film music since he followed Polanski’s request to do the music for his early short films, not knowing that a new part of his life is waiting for him. Soon he is a sought after film composer and writes music for the films of Jerzy Skolimowski, Andrzej Wajda and Henning Carlsen.

Already an internationally known jazz musician at the time and an icon of the artistic opposition to the communist Poland of the 1950s and 1960s, Komeda composes music for more than 60 films, by and by detaching himself from pure jazz and developing a new kind of soundtrack: quiet and calm although effective and full of surprising sounds. That makes him a pioneer of sound-design as it becomes known only a few years later. Continually Komeda works with Roman Polanski, with whom he establishes a close friendship. It is also Polanski who introduces Komeda to Hollywood’s dream factory and Swingin’ Sixties. There he creates the soundtracks for Roman Polanski’s The Fearless Vampire Killers and Rosemary’s Baby, which are the last and also the highlights of his work. But there his career came to a sudden end in 1968, when an accident caused the concussion that killed him.

The documentary is mainly a reflection on Komeda’s soundtracks and their connection to his life, but also a document about the attitude to life in a time of social, political and cultural change after war, about work and exodus of Polish artist in the 50s and 60s.

Claudia Buthenhoff-Duffywas born in Stuttgart in 1959, she studied Linguistics, Philosophy and Psychology at Free University in Berlin. From 1990-95 she was a freelance radio journalist covering such topics as music, childhood, culture and social issues. Claudia has been active in the film business since 2001. She finished the Kaskeline film school in Berlin with a shor t film, Finnen Finden, then worked for the German distributor neue visionen (in the areas of PR, promotional campaigns and funding for distribution). Claudia lives in Berlin.